The History of Literature Podcast is a member of the Podglomerate Network and Lit Hub Radio.

Now, are all the traitors present? Let's get started, shall we?

From rags to riches. I'm so sick of this. Working like a dog and being treated worse.

Yorkshire to New York. For climbers, you and me.

A life dedicated to revenge.

Let's make this an occasion to remember.

A woman of substance on Channel 4.

Stream now.

Hello, fine art, said John Ruskin.

Is that in which the hand, the head, and the heart of man go together?

End quote.

Ruskin was one of the outstanding men of 19th century Europe, an art critic, a visionary

thinker, and an influential social commentator who transformed the way human beings saw art

and related it to their own lives.

His influence continued well into the 20th century,

with figures like Proust, saying that even a dead Ruskin could continue to reach us like

the light from stars that have died long ago. Proust wrote a novel, gave it up as a failure,

and then read Ruskin. He translated Ruskin.

I do not claim to know English, he once said.

I know Ruskin.

And then, with Ruskin as a major influence to Proust's thinking,

he wrote what is probably the landmark achievement in 20th century literature.

...